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About the author

James Pethokoukis is a columnist and blogger at the American Enterprise Institute. Previously, he was the Washington columnist for Reuters Breakingviews, the opinion and commentary wing of Thomson Reuters.

How schools can produce more female economists and engineers

In a recent study (Anelli and Peri 2013) we ask if the gender composition of the high-school class attended by an individual affects his/her choice of study programme and subsequent long-term earning potentials. We use data that we collected on 30,000 students in Italian high schools over the period 1985-2005, including information on their high school, college career, family background and income as of 2005. We find that the gender ratio of high-school classmates significantly affected their choice of college major. In particular, women who attended a high-school class with a significant larger percentage of other female students (more than 75%) were significantly more likely to go on to choose college majors leading to high-paying jobs, namely engineering, economics, business and medicine. Those are also majors typically dominated by male students. On the other hand, female students in classes with a balanced gender mix were more likely to choose typically ‘female’ majors, that is, largely in the humanities and arts, and leading to lower earnings and limited overall career potential. … If an objective of schooling is to increase women’s career opportunities and thereby their salaries, our results would suggest that gender-separated classrooms would be an effective step in the right direction. Incidentally, men will also benefit, being encouraged to enroll in high-earning majors.

Discussion: (3 comments)

Girl/women-only colleges overcome the intimidation effect coming from loud and arrogant males. But then the problem is the mixed-sex workplace. So to promote “retention”, shall we have female-only engineering firms…and should the competition prove too rigorous, create a cartel of female-only customers, suppliers, etc?